Page 57 of The Marriage Method

Nell dreaded to think what Effie would make of Nell’s reduction in circumstances. For that’s what marriage was for her, however much society viewed it as the opposite. Nell hadn’t gained anything. She’d only lost. First, her position. Then, her authority. And now her very autonomy.

“That’s your mistake,” she said. “The same foolish error that prevents men from uttering plain truths in the presence of women. You view us as delicate creatures, too fine and fragile to be dealt with on terms of equality.”

Miles’s brows sank in a scowl. “I was trying to protect you.”

“I don’t require your protection.”

“You’d rather be exposed to every degradation this city has on offer? Sights that will haunt your dreams? Your waking hours, too?” He shook his head, unrepentant. “No. I won’t have it. If I can stand between you and the horrors of the world, I plan to do it. Call it foolish, if you like, but there it is. I won’t apologize for it.”

Nell’s heart stumbled. Drat him and his chivalry. And drat herself for being affected by it. “I don’t require an apology,” she said, mustering what remained of her indignation. “But I won’t be excluded, Miles. Lest you forget, not three days ago, I was the deputy headmistress of a school. Since then—”

“I know.”

“And now, for you to presume—”

“I don’t presume.”

“For Mr. Higgins, Mr. Flack, and Inspector Garrick to treat me as if I were a child—”

“They believed they were treating you with respect,” Miles said. “It wasn’t meant as an insult. I wouldn’t have allowed them to insult you.”

Her heart tripped again. It was impossible to be angry with him when he said such things. All the same…

She regarded him from her seat across the carriage with burgeoning suspicion. Was he managing her again? The same way he managed his hissing and spitting cats?

A lowering thought.

“I don’t wish to be handled with kid gloves,” she told him. “I may not have been part of your world these many years, but I’m not ignorant of it. I know what evils are out there. I don’t intend to shrink from them. I intend to fight them.”

“And to fight them you must see them up close in all their gruesomeness?” Miles looked steadily back at her. His jaw was tight. “You said if this was going to work between us that you and I must defer to each other’s strengths. One of mine is shouldering burdens for the people I care about. It wasn’t my first visit to a mortuary, but it would have been yours. You’ve had enough distress to contend with for the past three days. There’s no point in you bearing any more of it when I can bear it for both of us.”

Nell’s breath stopped for an instant. She was one of the people he cared about, was she?

But naturally she was.

He’d admitted as much last night. The mere fact of their marriage had made him care. She had his name now. She was, in law, his possession. He had a responsibility for her.

And perhaps that was truly all it was. Given the facts, it could scarcely be anything else. During the short and tumultuous course of their acquaintance, Miles had never once shown any genuine liking for the real her. For Penelope Trewlove—orphan, schoolmistress, radical bluestocking.

Rather the reverse.

Penelope Trewlove had both aggravated and exasperated him.

“You’re very considerate,” she said. “Still, you take my meaning.”

“And I trust you take mine,” he said. “I’d not wish the sights I’ve seen on my worst enemy.”

Nell felt a disconcerting twinge of guilt. In all her anger, she hadn’t considered that he might have been affected by what he’d seen when he’d gone into the mortuary with Inspector Garrick. “Was it very bad?” she asked.

“No.” He grimaced. “Yes.”

She exhaled heavily. “Oh, Miles…”

“There’s no dignity in it. It’s just…a pitiful end.”

“I’m sorry. And here I was selfishly trying to make a point.” She searched his face. “Did you know Mr. Cowgill well?”

“No. That’s the shame of it. I was brusque with him. Dismissive. I didn’t respect his type of reporting, despite how many papers it sold, and I made no effort to hide it. Perhaps that’s why he was out there, investigating something serious for a change. He was doubtless trying to prove himself to me.”